Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (PMC) (Puffin Modern Classics) Decide Now

I hated the original Willy Wonka movie. Gene Wilder was too smarmy, Charlie too bland and the Oompa-Loompas way too creepy. Hence, I saw no reason to read the book that inspired my loathing. But when I learned that Roald Dahl, author of the book, had actually dissociated himself from the Wonka adaptation, I though that maybe, just maybe, I might like the book.

And I loved it!!

The book outdoes the movie in every way. Charlie and his extended family are dirt poor and hence always hungry. A yearly birthday candy bar is all they can afford. The other children, winners of Wonka's Golden Tickets, are hopelessly sniveling, selfish, spoiled and self-absorbed. When they visit Wonka's chocolate factory, they are dispatched by their own greed and lack of discipline. The scenes where Veruca Salt is disposed of by a gang of shell-shucking squirrels is perfect. Dahl's Wonka is hyperkinetic, elfin and passionate about candy. He seems not to know or care where the disappearing children have gone. The Oompa Loompas are not the lumpish candy-men of the movie but a race of tiny people transplanted willingly to the factory. The only slightly disturbing part of the book was the way the nasty kiddos were got rid of, since they could have been drowned, incinerated, or blown up like balloons. But even this discomfort is addressed by book's end.

The best part of the book was Dahl's inventive cleverness about dream up new and wonderful candies. Edible pillows, cavity-filling caramels and sweets that let you spit in many colors were just a few of his delectable concoctions. As were the long songs sung by the Oompa Loompas to celebrate the removal of bad kids. Schindelman's illustrations gave just enough of a hint at the action without taking the reader's imagination entirely off the hook. Dahl's moral sense is an important subtext throughout the book. Greed and boorishness are punished; virtue, good manners and self-restraint are rewarded. Compare that with the ethical confusion of the Wilder film.

Definitely one of my favorite books in search of an adaptation that is true to the Dahl's spirit, which rewards the habit of reading books and other good behavior, even among the needy.Get more detail about Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (PMC) (Puffin Modern Classics).